75,000 Adopted Kids Become U.S. Citizens

Four-year-old Emily Maness has spent nearly
all her life with her adoptive family in Massachusetts. But in the
eyes of the U.S. government, she's still a South Korean.

Her parents, Donna and Andrew Maness, brought her home from the
town of Kyungsangbuk-Do in 1997, then waited a year for the
Immigration and Naturalization Service to schedule an interview for
citizenship. The couple from Falmouth canceled the interview
because of a family funeral, then completed paperwork to
reschedule.

But another year has passed and they've had no response.

Now they won't need an answer. That's because Emily and
younger brother Jack are among an estimated 75,000 adopted children
across the country who will become citizens simply by waking up.

The Child Citizenship Act, passed by Congress last year, grants
automatic citizenship to most adopted children born abroad,
provided they are under 18 and at least one parent or legal
guardian is a U.S. citizen. There are about 20,000 such adoptions
every year and the average wait for INS citizenship processing has
been two years.

The new law removes a bureaucratic and psychological hurdle for
parents who may well have waited years and paid up to $25,000 for
international adoptions.

"It's the best thing that could have happened to people in our
position," Mrs. Maness said. "The whole adoption process is
filled with obstacles. We justify ourselves over and over again. We
get FBI checks, state and local checks. We reveal everything about
ourselves to government agencies."

And that's before the INS application, which seeks similar
paperwork on parents and kids, including birth and marriage
certificates, photo identifications, alien registration cards and
certified English translations of documents written in other
languages.

A Personal Interest

Rep. William Delahunt, D-Mass., wrote the new law from
experience. He has an adopted daughter, Kara, 26, who became a
citizen several years after leaving Vietnam as a baby.

"Most people are totally unaware that a child adopted from
overseas does not become a citizen automatically," Delahunt said.
"Many of my colleagues were surprised to learn that this wasn't
the case already."

He will celebrate today with a ceremony at Boston's historic
Faneuil Hall. Senators who helped pass the law, among them Don
Nickles, R-Okla., and Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., plan to join him and
dozens of adoptive families, including the Manesses. Smaller events
are planned elsewhere in the country.

In Fort Worth, Texas, Don and Belinda Siperko plan to throw a
party for their four adopted children from Russia, ranging in age from 3
to 10. Andre, the oldest, has a basic understanding of what is
happening, but won't fully appreciate it until he's older, Don
Siperko said.

"Right now, it's something for my wife and me," Siperko said.

The selection of Faneuil Hall for the celebration in Boston is
no coincidence; it's where Delahunt's daughter became a citizen in
1980.

"For some," Delahunt said, "it's probably difficult to
understand the significance and meaning on a human level of your
child becoming a U.S. citizen. Our children are as American as
anyone else and contribute to this country significantly. It's a
day of real joy for a lot of people."

Making Adoption Easier

The estimate of affected children — 75,000 — is conservative,
Delahunt's office says. Not included are the tens of thousands of
children born to U.S. citizens living abroad, who also
automatically receive citizenship under the law.

Delahunt and others say numbers don't tell the whole story.

"It means we as a country are fundamentally changing the way we
view these people and how we view ourselves," said Adam Pertman,
author of the book "Adoption Nation" and father of two adopted
children.

Delahunt said the citizenship bill generated more e-mails and
letters from citizens than any other he's been involved with during
his 30 years in office.

"This is as much about promoting adoption as it is reducing
barriers," he said. "There are children everywhere, home and
abroad, in need of a family."